MAGIC 

COMPARISON OF GPS TROPOSPHERIC ZENITH PATH DELAY USING DATA OF THE ITALIAN GPS FIDUCIAL NETWORK.

Ferraro C. (1), Nardi A. (1), Pacione R. (1), Sciarretta C. (1), Vespe F. (2)
(1) Telespazio s.p.a. - Centro di Geodesia Spaziale Italiana - 75100 Matera
(2) Agenzia Spaziale Italiana - Centro di Geodesia Spaziale Italiana -
75100 Matera

Water vapor is a highly variable atmospheric constituent and one of the most poorly characterized meteorological parameters.
Improved knowledge of water vapor is needed for a variety af atmospheric research applications and for weather
forecasting. Ground-based GPS receivers can provide continuous information on water vapor at a site being water vapor closely
related to the wet component of the tropospheric zenith path delay. These concepts will be deeply explored in the MAGIC project, having a
dedicated presentation at EGS99. ASI-CGS is among the contributors to this international project.

In this work, we want to present extensively a comparison of tropospheric zenith path delays, obtained with two different
software (GIPSY and MicroCosm) and strategies (precise point positioning and network analysis), using GPS data of the Italian GPS
Fiducial Network, routlinely analysed at CGS in the framework of EUREF/IGS. Moreover the total tropospheric zenith path delay will be diveded into its dry and wet components using, when avaliable, surface pressure and temperature.



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